Cottonwood AZ. Recently I had a windy night high over the little mining town of Jerome. It was a reminder of how difficult it is to sleep when the trailer is rockin' and rollin'.
I wonder how many RVers considered living on a boat? I confess to having had that fantasy a few times. My boat fantasy never survives more than thirty seconds of scrutiny. What would it be like to sleep on a boat during a stormy night?
As difficult as it is to sleep through wind, rain is even worse. The drops sound like BB's gradually drilling their way through the roof. Then the dogs decide they need a walk. Just the act of walking from my trailer to my van is a messy nuisance.
Arizona was having an all-night rain, recently. It's no fun boondocking in soup, especially with the dogs, so I rolled into Walmart for the night. The noisy rain on the roof woke me, so I popped in a DVD movie. Outside sheets of water sloughed down the parking lot, with harsh pole lights glaring overhead. It was a strange, yet enjoyable, scene. Still, what would it have been like at the dry wash of last post during a rainstorm like this?
The movie was Roman Polanski's "MacBeth." He is one of the few directors who understands that when it rains, the ground gets muddy and actors get wet. The first half of the movie takes place in damp, gloomy, but sublime, Scottish scenery. Although I enjoyed the recognizable quotes and pretty speeches of Shakespeare, it was really Polanski's realism of the outdoors that impressed me most. After seeing one of Polanski's movies I want to grab a bedroll and head off to sleep on the ground somewhere, as Nastasia Kinsky did in that memorable scene in "Tess."
With my brain messed up by the hour and the rain conditions outside, watching this movie had a more powerful effect on me than ever before. I've noticed that reading a book can be a more powerful experience if my travel conditions and the book line up perfectly, but this is the first time it worked like that for a movie.
As usual it is one of the bad days that leaves the traveler with a powerful memory. We are creatures meant for toil and trouble. Days perfect in the usual sense are not remembered one year hence. They are immaterial. They vanish like breath into the wind.
I wonder how many RVers considered living on a boat? I confess to having had that fantasy a few times. My boat fantasy never survives more than thirty seconds of scrutiny. What would it be like to sleep on a boat during a stormy night?
As difficult as it is to sleep through wind, rain is even worse. The drops sound like BB's gradually drilling their way through the roof. Then the dogs decide they need a walk. Just the act of walking from my trailer to my van is a messy nuisance.
Arizona was having an all-night rain, recently. It's no fun boondocking in soup, especially with the dogs, so I rolled into Walmart for the night. The noisy rain on the roof woke me, so I popped in a DVD movie. Outside sheets of water sloughed down the parking lot, with harsh pole lights glaring overhead. It was a strange, yet enjoyable, scene. Still, what would it have been like at the dry wash of last post during a rainstorm like this?
The movie was Roman Polanski's "MacBeth." He is one of the few directors who understands that when it rains, the ground gets muddy and actors get wet. The first half of the movie takes place in damp, gloomy, but sublime, Scottish scenery. Although I enjoyed the recognizable quotes and pretty speeches of Shakespeare, it was really Polanski's realism of the outdoors that impressed me most. After seeing one of Polanski's movies I want to grab a bedroll and head off to sleep on the ground somewhere, as Nastasia Kinsky did in that memorable scene in "Tess."
With my brain messed up by the hour and the rain conditions outside, watching this movie had a more powerful effect on me than ever before. I've noticed that reading a book can be a more powerful experience if my travel conditions and the book line up perfectly, but this is the first time it worked like that for a movie.
As usual it is one of the bad days that leaves the traveler with a powerful memory. We are creatures meant for toil and trouble. Days perfect in the usual sense are not remembered one year hence. They are immaterial. They vanish like breath into the wind.
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